


... A Dead Man's Chest

by randi2204



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-23
Updated: 2010-03-23
Packaged: 2017-10-08 06:45:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/73825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/randi2204/pseuds/randi2204
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"Do you know how very </i>red<i> blood is?"</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	... A Dead Man's Chest

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: historical inaccuracies, OOC, deathfic. (Written before PotC: Dead Man's Chest)
> 
> Disclaimer: These pretty boys sail under the flag of the Mouse.

What it was that woke him in the dead of night, Will wasn’t sure.  He lay awake, staring at the darkened ceiling, listening hard.  After some moments, though, he realized that it could not have been a sound.  The night was still; even the insects had fallen silent.

 

Slowly he rose from his bed, and pulled on his clothes.  There was no sense in trying to go back to sleep.  He’d woken from nightmares often enough after his first encounter with the _Black Pearl_ to recognize that this sudden insomnia was of a similar strain.

 

The night was warm and mild.  _A good night for a walk,_ he decided with a sigh and pulled on his boots.

 

The cobbled streets of Port Royal were deserted.  Even the taverns had closed down.  Will’s footsteps echoed back from the building fronts, no matter how quietly he trod.

 

As he walked, he considered what could have woken him.  His first inclination was to say that it was merely Elizabeth’s absence… but Elizabeth had been away for weeks in Kingston, tending to her father in what would likely be his final illness.  Will had been prepared to close the smithy and join her, but she had urged him to stay and keep his business strong.  Reluctantly, he had agreed.

 

No, it could not have been Elizabeth, though in truth, he missed her dearly.  It was not the first time they had been parted in their years of marriage.  That didn’t mean he’d gotten used to her absence, but this time, he knew that was not it.

 

That meant it was something else, some other absence or presence that haunted him.  He pondered the possibilities as he wandered the streets.  From time to time, when the breeze was just right, he could hear the sounds of the sentries at the fort as they made their rounds.

 

Gradually, Will noticed that the sky was starting to grow lighter in the east, shading from black to midnight blue to grey along the horizon.  Roaming up streets and down, at last he found himself above the harbor, just as dawn was truly breaking.

 

He was quite used to seeing the _Dauntless’_ masts alone in port.  Perhaps that was why, at first, he missed the other ship; it had dropped anchor on the opposite side of the harbor.

 

The ship looked familiar, and Will frowned at it as it lurked in the shadows.  The shape of it, the way it rode in the water… they tugged at his memory, niggling and teasing, the answer just out of reach.

 

Then the early morning sunlight cleared the wings of the bay, and struck the visiting vessel, limning it in the colors of sunrise, gold and rose and black.

 

_Black?_  He blinked and looked again, certain that the shadows must be playing tricks on his eyes.  But no, what he saw was true.  _Black._

 

Then he recognized the figurehead, the maiden’s face turned up as if in adoration… or supplication, though she no longer wept tears of discolored paint.

 

‘Twas the _Black Pearl_.  And this, he knew suddenly, was the reason for the night’s restlessness, what had shaken him from his slumber.  She pulled him, waking his pirate’s blood, jollying him down to the water.

 

She looked diminished, somehow, as she rocked gently on the water, with her sails furled, her yards nearly bare.  But she drew him nonetheless, and he answered her summons.

 

As he made his way down to the docks, he wondered vaguely why Jack had returned to Port Royal so soon.  _Norrington surely would not want to come back here, and Jack has no great reason to love Port Royal, now that the Commodore is no longer here…_

 

There was a small boat moored at the quay, and he discovered again that rowing used muscles that smithing did not.

 

“Ahoy, the _Pearl__!_” he called, just as the dinghy bumped against the ship’s hull.

 

A familiar bewhiskered face peered over the rail, startled at the unexpected hail.  “Will, lad!” Gibbs shouted down.  “Come aboard!”  Within seconds, the coiled rope ladder had been kicked down.  Will clambered up the side, and was grateful for Gibb’s help in hauling himself onto the deck.

 

“’Tis good to see ye, lad,” Gibbs said, clapping Will on the back so heartily that the younger man staggered.

 

“And you, Mr. Gibbs,” Will replied, straightening.  “But what brings you to Port Royal?  I would have thought that after his last visit, Jack would not…”

 

He trailed off at the soulful look that crossed Gibbs’ face, and a chill descended over him despite the warming morning air.  Speaking a bit more sharply than he intended, he demanded, “What?  What’s happened?  Is Jack…?”

 

Gibbs shook his head.  “Nay, nay, ‘twasn’t Jack that we lost.”  But the blue eyes were still sad.

 

“But you lost someone?” Will was confused.  “Who…” If they had not lost Jack, then what could possibly have happened?  Who could have died that Gibbs would look so sorrowful?

 

Gibbs rested a hand on Will’s slim shoulder.  “Boy, I’ve news ye won’t want to hear.”

 

“But you must tell it.”  Deceptively calm and steady, he looked straight into the old pirate’s weathered face.

 

To Will’s surprise, Gibbs looked away.  “Aye, I must.”  He squeezed Will’s shoulder briefly, staring at the deck as if to gather strength.

 

Then, in little more than a whisper, he told him.

 

***

Some moments later, still in shock, Will stumbled through the door of the Captain’s cabin.  He could scarcely credit what Gibbs had said, could not imagine the man dead.

 

_“‘Twas Jamie we lost,” Gibbs whispered, daring at last to meet Will’s eyes, “an’ Jack’s been crazed since then, out of his mind on rum an’ grief.”_

_“Jamie?” Will staggered at the import of the words.  “You mean… Norrington?  Dead?”_

_“Aye.”_

_“But… how?”_

_Gibbs released him then and nodded to the stern.  “I think he’ll tell ye himself.  Truth be told, I think he _needs_ to tell someone.”_

 

A world without James Norrington seemed impossible.  _Jack_ without him, without that perfect foil…

 

“Will!”

 

The sound of his name, happily caroled in Jack’s voice, made him look around.  Jack stood—if the term could even be applied—by his hammock, swaying as if he’d been at sea for years and was on his first landfall.  The bottle of rum he held in one hand was about half-full; the heavy odor of alcohol in the cabin and the empty bottles and shards of glass along the walls gave proof to Gibbs’ words that Jack had seldom been sober in recent days.

 

Jack himself was not much changed from the last time Will had seen him, at first glance.  He was still as thin as a rail, still wore the same bright clothes, still sported the same outrageous scarf and decorations in his hair.

 

But, when Will looked again, as Jack tottered toward him wearing a grin that was too wide to be real, he saw the signs.  Grey grizzled his hair, too visible in the salt-stuck locks, and there were even threads of it in his mustache and the twin tails of his beard.  The bronze of his skin had faded.  His dark eyes didn’t need the kohl; they were deeply ringed with shadows, telling of night upon night spent sleepless in the embrace of the rum.  Worse, they no longer danced with mischievous light.  He’d lost that ageless air he’d always had.  He looked _old_ suddenly; old as he had not when Will had last seen him, not too long ago.

 

Jack tumbled into him then, as the ship rocked on wavelets, sending them both reeling into the cabin wall.  His breath pressed from him, both from his impact against the wall and Jack’s against him, Will gasped vainly for air, choking a little when every breath was tainted with soured alcohol.

 

“What’re you doin’ on my ship, whelp?” Jack asked, still wearing that unnervingly unreal smile.  He straightened away, overbalanced and started to fall backwards.

 

Without thinking, Will grabbed the collar of his waistcoat and towed him back upright.  When Jack managed to stay reasonably erect, he carefully let go of him.  Of course, the moment he was released, Jack sagged against the cabin wall and then to the floor in an ungainly heap of limbs.  He blinked up at Will in confusion.

 

With a sigh, Will got down on the cabin floor as well.  “Well, you _are_ in Port Royal, Jack,” he replied reasonably, and arranged himself to sit in comfort.  “Why would I not come aboard the _Pearl_?”

 

At his words, though, Jack lost that unnatural grin; it simply disappeared, as quickly as if it had never been.  “Port Royal,” he said softly, and stared down at the bottle, slanting it this way and that, watching as the glass and liquid within refracted the weak, dust mote-laden light.

 

In that moment, Will could easily believe, despite the miasma of alcohol around him, that Jack was quite sober.  _He’s been drinking to forget, but can’t._ 

 

“Gibbs told me… James was dead.  I’m sorry,” Will offered, his voice very quiet.  He kept watching Jack’s face, wondering what he would do next.

 

He saw Jack’s mouth twist, his eyes close.  The silence stretched out uncomfortably between them.  Will frantically tried to think of something else to say, and failed.

 

Finally, Jack spoke again, so softly that Will had to strain to hear him over the sound of the water against the hull.  “Aye.  Jamie… he’s dead.”  He opened his eyes and took a long swill off the rum bottle.

 

“I… I think a lot of people in Port Royal were surprised that he left with you so willingly,” he said, for lack of anything else to say.

 

Jack tilted the bottle again, watching the alcohol inside splash against the sides.  “Why?” he asked, his voice sharp with pain.

 

Will flinched at the tone.  “They didn’t know, of course… and Royal Navy and pirates generally _aren’t_ so friendly to each other…”

 

“Ah, but he wasn’t Navy anymore, was he?” Jack gave him another taste of that humorless smile.  “He’d resigned his commodorin’, hadn’t he?”

 

He nodded.  “True.”

 

Jack pointed at him, and the amount of alcohol running through him was revealed in the unsteadiness of his hand.  “An’ it wasn’t that I asked him to, though he’d asked me to stop priatin’ many a time, or at least accept a letter of marque.”

 

He nodded again.  Norrington had been chivvied into retiring by the Admiralty.  For every pirate he hung, it seemed that there was another eager to dare the noose to spite him, and his repeated failure to capture Captain Jack Sparrow of the notorious _Black Pearl_ had not gained him any friends among his superiors.

 

Had they known of the wary friendship that had grown between the Commodore and the pirate, and how that friendship had ever so gradually evolved into something else, they surely would have taken more direct and drastic action.

 

“But it bothered him, y’know.”

 

The seeming non-sequitur confused Will.  He stared at Jack, who was still studying the bottle.  “What did?”

 

One corner of Jack’s mouth lifted in a parody of a smile, and his eyes grew distant as he traveled through memory.  “Bein’ on th’ _Pearl_.  Seein’ piratin’ from th’ other side o’ th’ gun, so to speak.”  He swirled the rum in the bottle again.  “That we weren’t as bad as pirates are made out to be.  I know it did bother him a lot when we were actually _doin’_ it—attackin’ a ship.”  Something in his thoughts made him shiver, and he took a quick pull of rum.

 

“He helped you pirating?” Will looked at Jack skeptically.  That didn’t fit at all with the Commodore as he knew him, and he was about to say so when Jack gave him a drunkenly scornful look.

 

“Hell, no.  Nor did I ask him to.  But he was aboard—he couldn’t help, but he couldn’t _not_ know.”  His voice softened.  “He couldn’t help th’ ones we attacked an’ he couldn’t help us… an’ that troubled him most, I think, bein’ caught between.  He brooded about it all, Jamie did, when he didn’t have enough to keep him occupied.  I could read it in his face, even if he never told me.” He fell back to studying the bottle, resumed tipping it back and forth.  He watched the sloshing rum as if it were the most important thing he’d ever seen.

 

Silence hung between them like a curtain.  Will burned with all the questions he longed to ask, but Jack’s brooding air, the palpable grief surrounding him, prevented him.  That very sorrow made him feel that it was wildly inappropriate to ask anything.  He stared at Jack almost without seeing him, lost in the tangle of his thoughts, and trying to reconcile the stormy relationship he knew the pirate and the Commodore had had with the man soused in rum before him.

 

It wasn’t easy… until it struck him that there might have been more than could have easily been seen between them, a hidden devotion that no one had seen, something that went beyond the mere pleasure of bodies.  Then things started to fall neatly into place.

 

“Go on.”  Jack’s voice was heavy, resigned, and brought Will back to himself in an instant.

 

“Excuse me?” he asked, then flushed, embarrassed to be caught staring like a child.

 

Jack was not looking at him, was still studying the bottle and its contents.  “Ask.  I know you want to know.” He closed his eyes once more, and his hands stilled but for a faint trembling.  “You want to know how ol’ Jack dragged th’ Commodore out to sea an’ got him killed.  ‘Swhy you’re here, inn’t?”

 

Frowning—he’d never heard such _guilt_ in Jack’s voice before—he protested.  “No, it’s not.  I just was out walking…”

 

But Jack wasn’t listening, lost in self-reproach and rum and a need to lash out.  “You want t’know how Cap’n Jack Sparrow finally got th’ better of th’ scourge of piracy an’ did what th’ brethren have longed t’do for years—sent Commodore James Norrington down t’meet Davy Jones.  There inn’t a pirate alive that won’t want t’know how ‘twas done, you included, my fine lad,” he sneered.

 

Even drunk, Jack still knew how to rile him.  He took a breath, about to declare he was _not_ a—then let it out and said nothing.  As hurt and angry as Jack was, it’d be useless, he decided and glanced away.__

 

Unsurprisingly, Jack took his lack of response as consent. “So I’ll tell you about it then, shall I?” and his voice was hard, harsh. 

 

Will winced at the sound of it, but could not open his mouth to say he did not want to hear.

 

Because, God help him, he did.  And he agreed with Gibbs that Jack needed to speak of it… though he sincerely doubted that it would help.

 

_Likely there’s little this side of a miracle that would help Jack now,_ he thought.  He raised his eyes.

 

There were no grand gestures now, no great sweeps of Jack’s arms, no fluttering hand movements.  His fingers were curled so tightly about the bottle’s neck that his knuckles were white.  Will was vaguely surprised that the glass hadn’t shattered and sliced Jack’s hand to ribbons.

 

He wasn’t even sure that Jack would notice, even though it would mean the loss of all the rum.

 

“This wasn’t th’ first time Jamie had sailed wiv me,” Jack said, and his fingers clenched, relaxed.  “I’d taken him piratin’ before, once or twice, when he could get away.  An’ watching him, I knew it bothered him.

 

“So—an’ I want you to know what a supreme sacrifice this was—I charted a course to Barbados tryin’ to avoid all th’ major shippin’ lanes.  If we didn’t come across any ships, we wouldn’t have to attack ‘em.  Right?”

 

_That’s a daft piece of logic for a pirate captain,_ Will thought, and was immediately ashamed.  _After all, wouldn’t I do anything I could to spare Elizabeth distress?_

 

_So why am I here rather than in Kingston?_

 

“An’ Jamie could be easy… well.  Not _easy_, but I hoped he wouldn’t be quite so troubled.”  Then Jack snorted, his mouth twisting slightly.  “An’ I know nobody overheard me tell him, because we were in here.  It was like all his cares had disappeared, an’ he looked so young…” He took a deep breath, then a swallow of liquor.  “But th’ crew figured it when we went for days wivvout seeing hardly a sail.  An’ they didn’t enjoy having Jamie on board.  They couldn’t get past th’ fact he was _th’ Commodore_, that he’d captured an’ hung so many brethren.” 

 

“And the Com—I mean, James?” Will could have bitten his tongue at his gaffe, and the black look that Jack shot him did nothing to ease his embarrassment.

 

But Jack looked away, back down to the bottle, and the sudden tension bled away. “No, he wasn’t comfortable around me crew, eivver.  I hated to put him to work, but…”

 

In spite of himself, Will could not help but imagine _the Commodore_ in his powdered wig and brocaded coat, sweating as he clumsily climbed the rigging, and he smiled.  “You made _Norrington_ crew for you?”

 

Jack just blinked at him owlishly, puzzlement in his dark eyes.  Then he snorted, lips quirking, no doubt seeing the same thing in his mind. “Quite a picture, inn’t?”

 

But the humor disappeared as soon as it had arrived and grief made his shadowed eyes swim again.  “But that’s not how it was.”  He listed until his temple rested against the wall.  “He wasn’t _th’ Commodore_ wiv me, lad,” he replied, and his tone was weary.  “He was… wiv me, he was just a sailor, an’ a damned good one.  If his captain told him to do somethin’, he did it.  Not wivvout an argument sometimes,” he added, his lips curling in a humorless smile, “but he did it.  Wonderful for instillin’ th’ need to obey orders, th’ Navy.”

 

His gaze tracked back to the rum.  “But th’ crew tumbled to th’ fact that we were avoidin’ other ships, an’ someone thought that it was because I was pussy-footin’ around Jamie’s ‘delicate sensibilities’, an’ someone else thought it would be a good idea to have it out.”

 

“My God!  They mutinied?” Will was aghast.

 

“No, but they were thinkin’ about it,” Jack muttered.  “’Twas Jamie who…” He broke off quickly and gulped rum until his eyes watered, as it burned down his throat.  Will’s own pulsed in sympathy.

 

“James… suggested that you attack the next ship you came across.”  He didn’t even need an answer.  That was just the kind of straightforward thing that Norrington would do.  _If one has a problem, one solves it as quickly as one can._  He could almost hear the Commodore saying the words.

 

“Aye.  He did.”  Jack scrubbed one long-fingered hand over his face, as if trying to erase the days from then until now.  “’Twas only a day later that we came upon a merchantman.  A pretty little thing, she was, an’ from th’ way she moved, ‘twas plain she was stuffed wiv somethin’ good an’ rich.  We ran up our flag an’ bore down on her.” He stopped speaking, stared at the far wall of the cabin, his eyes dull.

 

Will was about to ask him what happened when he went on of his own accord.  “We were deceived, though… she wasn’t well armed, but when we grappled her an’ started to board, we found she had more fightin’ men than a merchant ship should have had, an’ they fought fiercer than tigers.  God… they just seemed to pour from everywhere.  An’ despite how good my lads are, we were sorely outmatched. 

 

“There comes a time when even th’ most bloody-minded pirate has to fall back, an’ I was tryin’ to get th’ lads back onto th’ _Pearl_.  Then, even in th’ middle of th’ fight, it felt like… like time slowed down, an’ somethin’ made me look over an’ Jamie was on deck.” His voice was flat and quiet, and Will had to strain to hear him.  “He was wearin’ a white shirt.  I can still see him, standin’ there barefoot, in just his breeches an’ shirt, wiv his hair wavin’ in th’ wind, loose from his ribbon…” He trailed off, looking through Will to that scene that haunted him.

 

Will held his tongue, forced his hands to lay calm so Jack would not know how much he wanted to know what had happened.

 

“Do you know how very _red_ blood is?”

 

He opened his mouth to reply, but Jack cut him off before he could do more than draw breath. 

 

“I don’t mean th’ blood from a finger pricked wiv a needle, or a sword-cut on your arm.   I mean _heart’s blood_, th’ blood that pours from a wound in th’ chest or belly.  Th’ blood that drips from a man’s mouth when he's dyin’…” He fell silent again.  After a long moment, he seemed to remember the rum, for he took a long swallow.

 

“Is that where he was wounded?” Will asked softly, when he’d finished.  “In the…”

 

“Aye.”  Jack closed his eyes.  He was silent for so long this time that Will worried perhaps he wasn’t going to speak again, or that he’d fallen asleep.  But then he stirred.

 

“I yelled at him to get back in th’ cabin, but he didn’t… he started _toward_ th’ fightin’.  Then… then all at once, I saw like red flowers bloomin’ on his shirt, an’ he kinda staggered backwards an’ fell.” His voice hitched slightly, and his fingers tightened on the bottle once more.

 

“I just stared.  Time had slowed down, but then it speeded back up again, an’ before I even knew what I was about, I was over by him, kneelin’, tryin’ to see how bad he was hurt.

 

“But his blood… it stained th’ deck.  His shirt was soaked wivvit… it trickled out his mouth… an’ his eyes were flat an’ glassy green.  There was no spark behind ‘em…” He shuddered, took another pull from the nearly-empty bottle.

 

“Jack…”

 

But the pirate spoke again, overrode whatever it was he would have said.  “I don’t even know how long I sat there.  Next I knew we were in open water.  Jamie… Jamie was cold.  I was holdin’ him, an’ had me face buried in his hair, tryin’ to keep from smellin’ all th’ blood, tryin’ to convince meself he was still alive…

 

“Anamaria was wantin’ me to let go of him.  ‘Come away, Jack,’ she kept sayin’, an’ Gibbs stood there, watchin’.  He was waitin’ for me to… to let Jamie go, so’s he could get him ready for…” His voice nearly broke this time.

 

Will tried again, reached out.  “Jack…”

 

But Jack flinched away from his touch.  “I washed him meself,” he whispered, “washed th’ blood away an’ dressed him up fine again.  Then I kissed his eyes an’ put th’ coins on ‘em an’ wrapped him in canvas an’…”

 

“That’s enough, Jack.”  This time, Will kept hold of him, and was not shocked that he could feel the bones of Jack’s thin shoulder through cloth and too-little flesh.  “That’s enough.  You don’t have to say any more.”

 

Jack shuddered beneath his hand, but did not shake him off.  After several long moments, filled only with the gentle slap of waves against the hull, he tipped the bottle up, drained the last of the liquor from it, then sat slumped against the cabin wall, cradling it in his hands. 

 

Will released his grip on Jack’s shoulder and sat back.  _Maybe Gibbs was right,_ he thought, studying Jack sadly,_ and maybe he _did_ need to tell someone about it… but I was right, too.  It hasn’t helped him a bit._  Being right brought him no joy.

 

“I should have given up piratin’ when he asked me to.”  Jack’s gaze was fixed on the empty bottle, as his unsteady hands turned it over and over.  “What harm?  Th’ _Pearl_ would have had a new captain, is all, right?  An’ Jamie… he’d be happy he wouldn’t have to hang me.”

 

Will frowned at the words, turning them over in his mind as he would a blade he knew was somehow flawed.  He simply could not imagine Jack apart from the sea, apart from the _Pearl_.  He could not imagine him leading any kind of life ashore.

 

And quite suddenly, he felt that Norrington _had_ known the same, that he had never truly _pushed_ Jack to give up his pirate’s ways.  He had asked, as his conscience had no doubt dictated, but Jack could no more give up pirating than he could give up breathing.  Maybe he’d hoped that Jack would accept the letter of marque instead… but he surely would have known that Jack did not accept limitations on his freedom gladly.

 

But that was not something he could say.

 

“Jack… If you had ever done as he asked, you wouldn’t be you, and he knew that.  He never would have wanted you to be something other than what you are.”

 

Jack looked up at that, and eyed him angrily.  “Oh, aye, is that so?  Well, Will me lad, what I _am_ is what got him killed.”  He held Will’s gaze for a moment, then the dark eyes slid away, back to the bottle.

 

There was no answer for that that Jack would want to hear, so Will curbed his tongue, bit back the words he’d intended to say.  Instead, he asked, “Why have you come back to Port Royal?  There is nothing here to draw you now.”  He winced that the brutal thrust of the words; he had not meant to sound so harsh.

 

But Jack did not notice, or if he did, he chose not to respond in kind.  “He was carryin’ his _sword_, lad, th’ one you made for him,” he said, and the words fell heavily from his mouth.  “He musta heard th’ fightin’, me an’ Gibbs shoutin’, an’ felt he needed to help us… an’ he was headin’ for _me_ when they shot him.”  When he looked up at Will this time, his eyes swam behind tears.  “He died a pirate’s death an’ that’s somethin’ he _never_ deserved.

 

“I never thought I deserved it, eivver… but I do.”  His gaze was surprisingly steady.

 

_A pirate’s death… in Port Royal?_ It took Will rather longer than he liked to figure it out.  _He’s going to turn himself in to let Captain Gillette hang him!_ He gaped like a fish, mouth working but no sounds emerging.

 

Jack nodded as the understanding dawned in Will’s face.  “Aye, lad, you’ve got it.”  Using the wall to brace himself, practically clinging to it at times, he managed to climb to his feet.  Wavering, weaving, even more unstable than he had been before, he said, “’Tis off I am to turn meself in to th’ fine Navy officers of th’ fort, to let them boast that they’re th’ ones that finally caught Captain Jack Sparrow an’ made him swing.  Let ‘em do it up right.” He turned to the door, almost fell, but caught himself.

 

Will clambered up and grabbed his arm as he swayed.  “Jack, no!  I can’t let you…” Suspicious, he narrowed his eyes.  “You can’t have been sober when you decided this!”

 

Amazingly, Jack still had enough strength and leverage to yank his hand from the blacksmith’s grasp.  “Aye, I can, an’ I was!” he cried.  “I was so sober it _hurt_ when th’ lads put Jamie overboard… an’ every time I close my eyes, I can still see th’ bright red splashes on his shirt…”

 

His heart twisted in his chest at the unutterable _pain_ that tore from Jack’s throat, and Will scrambled for some way to keep Jack from his elaborate plan of suicide.  In a flash, he saw a way out, and reversed course quickly.  “I’m sorry,” he said, ducking his head and peering up through his eyelashes.  “I simply… I did not realize how much…” Breaking off, embarrassed, he cleared his throat, straightened and offered, “I’ll row you to shore, if you like?  You might have a hard time of it by yourself.”

 

Jack eyed him with well-deserved wariness, but Will’s contrite air convinced him that the offer was meant.  Slowly, he nodded.  “Aye.”  The ship rocked again on the soft swells, and he staggered.  “Help me to th’ boat, then, lad.” He threw out an arm for balance, or perhaps for Will to take to support him.

 

Will grabbed it, jerked Jack a few startled steps closer, then sent one blacksmith’s fist crashing into his jaw.  Jack’s head snapped back, and he crumpled gracefully to the floor.

 

Though the pirate was unlikely to wake up any time soon, Will lost not a moment in tying Jack’s hands behind him.  For good measure, he pried off Jack’s boots and bound his feet, too, before laying him in the hammock.  He wasn’t a sailor, but he knew the knots would hold.  “If you want to kill yourself, Jack,” he told the unconscious form, “you’ll have to do it some other way.  I barely saved your neck from the noose the last time, and I don’t think I could do it again.”

 

When he stepped back outside the cabin, he took a great lungful of fresh air, and sagged against the door.

 

“Did ye make him see sense?” Gibbs’ voice rumbled in his ear.

 

“No, but I made him see stars.”  Will shook his head.  He glared at the old pirate.  “You might have warned me about that.”

 

Gibbs snorted.  “Aye, an’ ye would have gone in guns blazing against it, an’ he’d have got the wind up an’ said nothin’.”

 

Will sighed.  “I suppose you’re right.”  The sun was well risen, now, and the sky bright blue, sharply outlining the fort above the harbor.  For a minute, he considered his options.

 

_How much can I do, really?  The only thing that might mend Jack’s pain is time… and that only if we can keep him from diving into the noose…  or diving off the ship and letting himself drown._  He sighed again, eyeing the fort.

 

“They’re only holdin’ fire ‘cause they think we’ve still got Jamie aboard.”

 

_Gibbs can fairly read my mind,_ he thought, and nodded.  “So let’s get underway, Mr. Gibbs.”  Will grinned as he faced the older man.  “I’m… _commandeering_ this ship.  I’ve heard the sea cures many ills.  Make for Kingston, and slowly.  Maybe we can make Jack see reason before then.” His smile faded.

 

Gibbs looked at him, eyes blue and wise.  “Aye, lad, maybe… but I know no easy cures for a broken heart.”  He began bellowing orders.  Leisurely, the _Pearl_ moved out of the bay.

 

As the wind bellied out the sails, Will leaned over the rail, watching the brilliant turquoise water as it slipped away in the ship’s wake and pondering Gibbs’ words.  At length, he decided that the truth of the matter wasn’t that Jack’s heart was just broken—it was also gone, lost.

 

For no heart beat in a dead man’s chest, and now… Jack’s heart lay at the bottom of the Caribbean.

 

***

July 30, 2005


End file.
